Mercerizing liquors



Patented June 23, 1936 UNITED STATES- PATENT OFFICE MERCERIZING LIQUORS Jacques Feldmann, Basel, Switzerland, assignor to the firm of J. R. Geigy A.

zerland" G., Basel, Swit- No Drawing. Application August 18, 1934, Serial No. 740,539. In Germany September 7, 1933 10 Claims.

proceeds only slowly and lacks uniformity. Many proposals have been made for overcoming this objection, either by pretreating the textile materials, for example, by Kier boiling, or by adding to the alkaline bath a substance which imparts to it a greater capacity for wetting the material.

The use of phenols and homologues thereof for this purpose has long been known, and it has since frequently been attempted to increase the insuflicient action of these compounds by suitable additions, such as soaps, Turkey red oils, alcohols, amines, ethers and so on.

According to this invention the wetting and penetrati've capacity of alkaline baths for the treatment of textiles can be considerably increased by adding to the liquid cymene-sulph amide and a monoor di-carboxylic acid of the terpene or camphor series, together with a solvent distributor. The quantity of the added substances may amount to 5 20 grams per liter of liquor.

The addition of aromatic sulphonic and carboxylic acids to alkaline liquors, even together with a solvent distributor, has the disadvantage, explicable by the law of mass action, that the salts of these acids which are formed are only sparingly soluble owing to the high concentration of the bath in alkali and are therefore in greater part precipitated. Cymene-sulphamide exhibits specific properties in concentrated solutions of alkalies,-and moreover, as a sulphamide it is far less dependent on the aforesaid influences which limit the'solubility. It acts as an excellent solvent distributor for the alkali salts of the 'carboxylic acid of the terpene and camphor series.

A mercerizing liquor containing-additions in accordance with the present invention has a very 'high capacity for wetting and penetrating the textile material; the concentrated alkali 7 solution takes effect very rapidly and uniformly and raw cotton which has not been de-sized can be used withoutv any pre-treatment. This excellent wetting action, especially in the first fifteen seconds, is'possessed by neither of the classes of substances alone. These are indeed good wetting agents when added separately to a mercerizing liquor together with a solvent distributor, but .the terpene and camphor carboxylic acids particularly have a tendency to precipitate,

per liter 15 grams of a mixture consisting of:

so that the wetting action is greatly reduced. Only by the combination of substances of the two chemical classes is it possible to attain the rema'rkable wetting actiontogether with the other favourable properties nowadays required of a 5 wetting agent for use in mercerizing baths.

The wetting action may be somewhat further increased, without detracting from the general properties, by the addition of a small proportion of a hydrocarbon of the benzene series particu- 10 larly cymene.

As solvent distributortheremay be used, for example, phenol, a cresol, a xylenol, a mixture of cresols, methyl alcohoLethyl alcohol a highly sulphonated oil or the like. 15

Among the carboxylic acids of the terpene and camphor series suitable for use in the invention there may be named in particular bornylene carboxylic acid, campholic' acid, isocampholic acid, fencholic acid, oxyfencholic acid, hydropinenic 0 acid, sabinenic acid, camphoric acid, cineolic acid and so on. The following examples illustrate the invention, but it will be understood that the proportions given therein may vary within wide limits:

Example 1 To a caustic soda solution of 30 B. are added 30 Percent Fencholic acid 5 Cymene-sulphamide 10 35 Crude ores ol The mercerizing liquor thus prepared wetsraw cotton uniformly within'a few seconds, so that the mercerizing operation may be conducted with 40 great certainty and without the faulty results which would otherwise frequently occur.

ample 1. 

